Firings do need to occur at USC football, this is true. In all likelihood, Alex Grinch needs to be fired as defensive coordinator at the end of the season unless he can deliver good performances against Washington and Oregon in November.
Other assistant coaching positions which are not delivering maximum value to the Trojans also need new and better voices to provide a higher quality of coaching, so that a team which is getting shoved around at the line of scrimmage right now can get tougher and more rugged when USC moves into the Big Ten for 2024.
Yes, firings need to occur … but not to Lincoln Riley himself. Whoa. Let’s all settle down and be reasonable.
Riley hasn’t done a good job this season, but he’s still on pace to win at least nine games. USC would have 20 wins in Riley’s first two seasons.
That’s a lot better than Clay Helton, who had two really good Sam Darnold-aided seasons and nothing else in seven years at USC.
Riley did a tremendous job in Year 1. Year 2 has gone south. Changes need to be made by Riley.
Riley isn’t the one who needs to be thrown out. Not at all.
Yet, some fans are hitting the panic button, as you can see below.
Sigh.